We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Natalie Lauf. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Natalie below.

Natalie , appreciate you joining us today. Can you tell us a bit about who your hero is and the influence they’ve had on you?

My parents are my heros. They raised me to believe I could do and be anything I wanted as long as I worked hard. They taught me that nothing in life will be handed to you and you have to work for the things you want. I get my work ethic from my father who has worked his whole life to get where he is through hardship and struggle to keep a roof over my brother’s and my heads. My mother is my best friend and through out my life she has taught me that everyone is going through things and you should always be kind and lend a hand when you can. I would not be who I am today without them.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

My name is Natalie Lauf. I am a graphic designer by trade and an influencer by choice. I first got into graphic design because of my love for books and literature. I wanted to be the person designing book covers that would make people fall in love with a book at first sight. I have been working on redesigning some of my favorite book covers as a pet project. Then I had to do a senior capstone project for my bachelor’s degree and and CrystalMagnam’s Booklovers Guild was born. I wanted to share my love of books with others. My project was called “Carpe Librum” or “Seize the book”. It focused primary on bringing together people from all over through the bustling bookish communities on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube that had grown over the course of COVID. These were communities of booklovers just like me and I wanted to show how exciting and fun reading could be. I offically started my own TikTok and started making my own bookish content in August of 2024. I had just lost my job and I was struggling to find a purpose. One day I picked up my phone and decided to follow my maternal grandfather’s advice “nothing beats a failure but a try” and so I tried and now I have 1,203 fellow booklovers that follow and support me. My love for books lead me to graphic design where I one day hope to pursue a career in book publishing as a cover artist but it also lead me to this exciting path as an influencer where I can share my passion and bring people together.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

I built my audience through engagement and consistency. I talked with my followers and viewers through the comment section and now through my livestreams that I do almost every other week. It took a long time to build and sometimes it fluctuates. My advice for someone starting out is try to be consistent but also do what you love and do it your way. If you try to do this journey the way everyone else does you’ll get discouraged because it won’t be fun. Let loose and have fun with it! Do it for you not for everyone else.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

Alot of creative fields like graphic design are hard for people to understand sometimes because they think there is a lot of finacial risk in what we do. The reality is that there is a ton of competition in both of my fields. In graphic design you have to be really good at what you do and how you do it to get into places that allow you to make a profit. The same can be said for social media. Everyone seems to be trying to make a living on social media. The truth is there is only one you and only you can bring your unique perspective to everything you create and that is worth taking a risk on to do something you love and that’s what it is to be a creative.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://crystalmagnam.myportfolio.com/natalie-lauf
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/crystalmagnam?igsh=MWVydWZ2YWZqaXMyYg==
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/natalie-lauf-51b454201?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=android_app
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@crystalmagnam?si=hCJ4vxU_7gJQbTID
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@crystalmagnam?_t=ZT-8yQmMjEKFJO&_r=1